


puzzle piece

by thereisnoreality



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Future Fic, Intimacy, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:34:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27516949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thereisnoreality/pseuds/thereisnoreality
Summary: “You’re mine, aren’t you?” Jeno asks.Jaemin’s thumb stops for a moment —  just a moment — pausing on his third knuckle before it resumes again.“Of course,” Jaemin sighs, and tucks his face in deeper into Jeno’s neck. His breath washes over the top of Jeno’s padding, sending goosebumps trickling down his neck, spine, following the line of his body all the way down to his finger tips, carefully ensconced in Jaemin’s hand. “You’re mine too.”
Relationships: Lee Jeno/Na Jaemin
Comments: 17
Kudos: 228





	puzzle piece

**Author's Note:**

> i've been on a huge nomin kick lately so here we are 
> 
> a big thank you to my beta <3

_All of the days that we spend apart_

_My love is a planet revolving your heart_

_\- Superstar, MARINA_

They’re trundling along a strangely unpacked subway at seven thirty in the morning, the sun still resisting to rise over the top of the river, huddled into their school uniforms and pressed against each other to steal whatever warmth is left, when Jeno realises it.

This car has only a handful of people in it, all of them weary-looking office workers, bent over their phones or eyes closed, headphones in, looking to all the world as if it were the end of the day, not the beginning of one. Donghyuck and Mark aren’t here either today, having been pulled out of yesterday’s dance practice with no explanation whatsoever. Jeno had watched them go, a bubble of excitement bumping into a similarly sized bubble of jealousy, of resentment, before he turned back to the mirror, only to see the same emotions mirrored in Jaemin’s eyes, reflected back at him. It had made Jeno feel slightly better. At least there was one other person he knew who would always understand him.

There’s no one to pay attention to them now, even though the opposite is always wrung into their heads — someone is always watching, their managers, their teachers, their trainers tell them. A camera is always there, even when you can’t see it. Terrifying to say the least, but at least it taught them caution.

Today, however, caution has been thrown to the wind. There is no one paying attention to them, and thus there is no reason to pull his hand away from Jaemin’s where they’re loosely intertwined on Jeno’s lap, Jaemin’s head pressed into his shoulder. Jeno would have thought he’d fallen asleep if not for the slow trace of Jaemin’s thumb against the back of his hand, pressing lightly into the veins that had started to protrude when Jeno started yet another diet last month.

“Hey,” Jeno says softly, when he realises. His heart does a funny thump in his chest, like trying to leap forward only to be caught by the unyielding bars of his ribs, bone white and strong. It seems so simple now that his brain has latched onto the thought, like jellyfish tentacles floating through an open, empty ocean only to finally, at the last moment, catch something shimmering and small. Something that makes him feel a little less alone than before.

Jaemin makes a tiny noise to show he’s listening, and Jeno tilts his head atop Jaemin’s, watching the scenery whizz past them in a dizzying array of blue, green, yellow, and gray, the colours of a sleepy November sunrise washing over them as the cold penetrated every inch of their chilled bones.

“You’re mine, aren’t you?” Jeno asks.

Jaemin’s thumb stops for a moment — just a moment — pausing on his third knuckle before it resumes again.

“Of course,” Jaemin sighs, and tucks his face in deeper into Jeno’s neck. His breath washes over the top of Jeno’s padding, sending goosebumps trickling down his neck, spine, following the line of his body all the way down to his finger tips, carefully ensconced in Jaemin’s hand. “You’re mine too.”

Jeno takes a deep breath and the exhale sounds more like a song of relief, of acceptance. The sun stretches its hands over the curve of the sky and heaves itself up as they grow closer to school, casting an almost reluctant warmth over them as they get off the subway and walk the last ten minutes to school, shoulders bumping into each other and hands tucked inside Jeno’s coat, still tightly wrapped around each other.

Jaemin’s thumb never stops moving over his hand.

It feels a little like tearing his own skin apart when they part for their separate classes at midday — the only time they’re apart the whole day. Jaemin does modern dance while Jeno heads off to urban, spending the entire time forcing his limbs to work in ways they don’t entirely want to.

“See you at lunch,” Jaemin says as he peels himself off the chair, unhooking his ankle from around Jeno’s. His hand runs over Jeno’s head, just brief enough for it to look playful.

“Don’t get hurt,” Jeno says, watching Jaemin leave, newly-bleached brown hair bobbing through the sea of black.

It’s only an hour, but it has the potential to cave Jeno’s chest in.

* * *

“Hey,” Jeno mumbles, right before he’s about to fall asleep. He peels his eyes open forcibly and turns to look at Jaemin.

The hotel they ended up in is right on the shore; Jeno doesn’t know how or why the production team decided to book them such an expensive room for two nights, but he’s not complaining. The room service had been fantastic and the view outside their window, staring right out at the dark ocean they’d spent half of today freezing in, was gorgeous. There are two beds, but they’d shoved them together and Jaemin has sacrificed his side to the cold sea breeze floating in through the open window in favour of curling up next to Jeno. Jeno had protested against the window being open, preferring to get a warm night of sleep, but Jaemin had insisted.

“The ambience, Jeno!” He’d said, throwing open the window and looking out at the ocean lapping at the sand, retreating and advancing, peppering the beach with salty licks of frigid water. “We’d never get this in Seoul.”

“It’s raining,” Jeno had deadpanned. “There’s water on the window sill and the floor.”

Jaemin had ignored him.

“Hey,” Jeno says again, poking Jaemin until he’s shifting.

“Mm,” Jaemin hums, a twitch of a frown creasing over his face as the blanket slips off his shoulder and down his waist.

Jeno absentmindedly pulls it back up. “Did you just propose to me on a neon sign board in front of ten cameras on national television so we could win on a variety show?”

Jaemin peers at him. “No,” he sighs, throwing an arm around Jeno’s waist and reeling him closer. “I didn’t.” His mouth brushes Jeno’s collarbone. “When I propose to you, it’ll be in front of the whole world so everyone knows. And _you’ll_ definitely know without having to ask me.”

“Oh,” Jeno says, after a beat. “Good to know.” His cheeks feel hot, and he wants to curl up tighter all of sudden.

Jaemin looks up at him, nearly slamming his head into Jeno’s chin. “You’re mine,” he whispers, and it’s loving, like a promise. Unbreakable. It curls up right beside Jeno, twisting into the warmth of their embrace and burrowing there. “When I marry you, I’m going to make sure the whole damn world knows it too.”

* * *

They enter SM on the same day but not at the same time.

Jeno lives only an hour and a half away from SM’s main training building and he arrives bright and early, still scrubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

From there, it’s all _go, go, go,_ with forms to sign and a terrifying dorm to throw his two measly bags into before heading back to the company to be introduced to his managers until he finally stumbles into his first vocal class… And fails terribly.

Jeno is not a singer, they decide soon after his entrance into the company. He’s not too broken up about it.

At five pm, the door to the studio on the fourth floor opens, interrupting their dance class. Jeno pauses gratefully, wiping the sweat off his face with an already disgustingly damp shirt and forcing back the pang of hunger — he hadn’t been able to break for lunch, not when the vocal instructor had asked him to stay back and run through scales until his voice had hurt — to see a new boy enter the room.

Na Jaemin, he introduces himself, a wide shaky smile drawing across his face and through the crowd of boys, all desperate, all focused on the same goal that only some of them would be able to reach, his eyes meet Jeno’s and something falls perfectly into place.

* * *

Jaemin hasn’t responded to the last ten texts he’s sent and it feels like Jeno is trying to swallow something sharp every time he looks at his phone, like a chip that he hadn’t chewed properly and had gotten stuck at the back of his mouth, poking painfully into the sides of his throat.

He’s read them all, it shows: all ten messages, ranging from easygoing to pushy to straight-up annoyed — an emotion Jeno rarely ever directs at Jaemin. All of them, however, are unanswered.

If spending an hour apart from Jaemin for such a silly thing like dance class — nowhere near as aggressive or interesting as SM’s had been — had been hard, had felt like heartache, then not having seen him for upwards of seven months is downright miserable.

The call from their irate manager sounds, a warning to get going before they’re late for the _third_ morning in a row.

“Coming!” Jeno calls. He sends one last text, knowing Jaemin probably won’t be up to see it, as it’s somewhere before the crack of dawn but hoping he’ll respond to this one. Maybe today will be a good day. Jeno grabs his bag and slams out of his shared room with Jisung.

“Finally,” their manager sighs, shutting the door behind Jeno and shepherding him towards the elevator. “You have no idea how much _I_ get yelled at if you kids aren’t in hair and makeup on time.”

Jeno shoves his phone into the pocket of his sweats and casts a sheepish smile up at his manager. “Sorry, hyung.”

It is not a good day.

Pre-recording for Music Bank takes a lot longer than it should; each one of them somehow manage to screw it up on completely different takes, and by the fifth run through, the lines have tightened around Mark’s eyes and the director’s instructions are clipped and harsh over the loudspeaker. Donghyuck’s stopped trying to smile any time a camera isn’t focused on him and Jisung looks exhausted, massaging a flowering bruise on his knee, vivid against the bright white of his shorts.

“Take a deep breath,” Mark says, as they huddle together on the stage. “Come on guys, we’ve practiced this a thousand times. We could do it in our sleep.” He tries to cast an encouraging grin but it falls flat, strained around the edges.

Jeno flicks his bangs out of his face and steels himself. Exhaustion lives on their shoulders like a permanent vulture, talons hooked in and waiting for the first measure of weakness. He closes his eyes as the music starts again. It’s not like they have any other choice but to continue, though, is it?

Jaemin still hasn’t answered his text. Jeno stares down at the read message, the lack of a yellow 1 mocking him through the screen, and unexpectedly, tears burn at the back of his eyes.

He chokes back the lump in his throat and pushes past the mess of the dressing room, down the hallway and into the bathroom. They have to be onstage for a fansign in less than ten minutes, but Jeno is about to start ugly crying and none of his members need to see that.

The bathroom is thankfully unoccupied and Jeno slams the door shut behind him, fumbling for the tissues at the same time as the call rings through. Jaemin doesn’t pick up, but Jeno didn’t expect him to.

“Hey, asshole,” he hisses as soon as the voicemail prompt allows him to. “I get that you’re sad and bitter and everything, but it would be nice to at least acknowledge me and the _ten_ messages I _know_ you’ve been reading. I’m sorry you couldn't come back for promotions this time but—” he chokes, staring at himself in the mirror and tries to press the tissue to his bottom of his eyes before his makeup is ruined. Jeno heaves in a shuddering sob. His lungs are tight and his feet ache, and he thinks he sprained his shoulder yesterday and hasn’t found the time to ice it properly; everything is fast and furious these days, and the heartache threatens to swallow him whole, threatens to rend the Earth below his feet in half and destroy him.

Everything is just a little bit bad, just a little bit too hard, and Jaemin isn’t here, isn’t beside Jeno like he should be.

“Jaemin, I miss you,” Jeno says finally into an empty phone, with no one listening on the other end, his voice cracking messily and throat burning. A fresh wave of tears gets absorbed by a new tissue and the call of his manager in the distance signals the end of his time. “Please. I can’t do this without you. _Please_.”

Jeno stirs awake when the bedroom door creaks open. At first he thinks it’s just Jisung, coming back from the bathroom, but then the figure inches towards his bed and the cover is carefully pulled back and he sees Jaemin in the dim light pouring from the hallway; he smells like the night air, cool and fresh, and he’s absolutely freezing as he slides in next Jeno.

“Jaemin?” Jeno hisses when he realises, his heart pounding so loudly, he can barely hear himself. “What are you doing here?”

“Shh,” Jaemin whispers, climbing into his bed. “You’ll wake Jisung.”

Jeno stares. “You’re…. You’re not supposed to be here,” he points out dumbly. “Are you— Are you back?”

“No,” Jaemin says softly. “I just couldn’t stay away.” His fingers brush Jeno’s cheeks and his voice is painfully somber, aching with unsaid things. “I’m sorry, Jeno. I’m sorry for not responding, I just — I can’t do it without you either — I’m sorry.”

In the dark, Jaemin’s practically invisible, but Jeno seeks him out anyway; a ship guided by his North star. “It’s okay,” he murmurs, unable to stop himself from shifting closer, as close as he can get to Jaemin. “You’re here now.”

Jaemin’s hand wraps around his and pulls it to his chest, cradling Jeno’s cheek with the other. “Always,” he promises, something wet and sad hovering in his throat. “I’ll always be here for you.”

* * *

There’s just something about the way Jaemin sinks into him when he finally falls asleep that makes Jeno smile, make something slip perfectly into place in his heart.

They’re 10 hours into the flight to LA but somehow, Jeno never wants this trip to end. If it ends, Jaemin will wake up and he’ll move away.

Jaemin twitches, face creasing for a second before he settles into Jeno again, a soft sigh escaping him. Jeno fixes the blanket around his shoulders as best as he can without waking Jaemin up and leans his head against Jaemin’s looking out the window at the sunset.

Jaemin’s back and that something that had been rattling around in Jeno for months, dark and awful and painful settles, vanishes. Jeno closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.

* * *

“I like your hair.”

“You hated it before I left.”

Jaemin humphs and runs his hand through Jeno’s shorn hair again. “That had less to do with the hair and more to do with you leaving.” Jeno smiles down at him. “Well, we’re here now,” he says softly, shifting so Jaemin’s lying on top of him more comfortably. “All done with enlistment and everything.”

Jaemin hums and falls silent. Jeno lets him, closes his eyes and lets Jaemin play with his fingers; revels in the sound of his heartbeat so close to his own, the sweet smell of Jaemin’s shampoo — the same he’s had for years—-drifting off his similarly short hair. They’d entered the military on the same day and had been discharged a week apart from each other. It had been the worst week of Jeno’s life, to wake up every morning at the crack of dawn and know there was still time left before he could see Jaemin again.

Jaemin’s fingers wrap around his ring finger and stay there. Jeno smiles and peers down at him. “What are you doing?”

“Measuring,” Jaemin murmurs. “I think your fingers lost weight in the military.”

“I don’t think fingers do that.”

“Yours did.”

“You gonna tell the whole world?”

Jaemin looks up at him. His eyes are the same eyes Jeno has seen practically every day for fifteen years. The same mouth, curved up and sweet; the same hands, curled around Jeno’s, thumb stroking over the back of his hand, the same familiar presence against Jeno, fuelling the pump of his heart, the flood of his blood through his veins.

“Eventually,” he says. “Right now, though, I just want to keep you to myself.”

Jeno wraps his arms around Jaemin and pulls him closer even though they’re already plastered against each other. His couch is going to give up on him soon; Jeno hasn’t used it in eighteen months. “I’m okay with that.” A pause. “I missed you.”

Jaemin’s smile tastes sweet.

“I missed you too,” he whispers when they part. Jeno’s heart thumps painfully inside his chest, like a bird recognising the coming of spring, the triumphant song slamming through his ribs and veins until it engulfs him.

“My Jaemin,” Jeno says, swallowing down the lump in his throat and cradling Jaemin’s cheeks. “I love you.” It doesn’t feel like enough, those simple three words. It doesn’t feel like enough to encompass all that Jeno feels about Jaemin, all the years between them, all the memories, all the hurt and happiness and joy and love. It doesn’t feel like enough, but it’s all Jeno has, right now, anyway. He’s dumbstruck with joy, finally content after waiting for so long, and yet his words fail him. So Jeno repeats, “I love you.”

Jaemin doesn’t begrudge him his lack of words; he always knows. “I love you too,” he says quietly. His hand tightens around Jeno’s and he presses his face back into the crook of Jeno’s neck, wrapping his free hand around him, curling into him, tight and warm. “You’re always going to be mine,” Jaemin whispers, a puff of warm air hitting his neck.

Something slots back into place.

**Author's Note:**

> [twt](https://twitter.com/_donghyuck_)   
>  [cc](https://curiouscat.me/thereisnoreality)


End file.
